But for the Lib Dems coming fifth behind UKIP, with just a raisin bag of votes, calls into question their very existence as an electoral force.

Riven by sex scandals, battered by the voters as handmaidens to a Tory government and completely failing to get their message across, the Lib Dems limp on to the next electoral test.

In the European elections on May 22nd the Lib Dems are faced with the prospect of being wiped out.

George Lyon, the former MSP, currently holds the last of Scotland's six Euro seats, which are distributed in proportion to the votes cast.

In the race to be last the Lib Dems now face the very real prospect of being overtaken by the Greens or, even more humiliatingly, the rising tide of Eurosceptic UKIP as they were last night.

Beyond that the eleven Lib Dem seats in Scotland, each with their individual characteristics, look vulnerable. The three other parties are each convinced they can take a share of the spoils.

Don't underestimate the Lib Dem's "cockroach" ability to survive, as their party president Tim Farron described it, but the being a Lib Dem candidate looks like a short-term career prospect this morning.